John Birch, China, and the Cold War

Professor Terry Lautz, Moynihan Research Fellow at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University, will discuss his new book (Oxford, 2016), the first authoritative study of John Birch, who was a missionary and soldier in China during the Second World War. Thirteen years after his death in a dispute with Chinese Communist soldiers, he became the name-sake of the controversial right-wing John Birch Society.  Lautz argues that the perceived martyrdom of John Birch is a misguided view, appropriated for a Cold War political cause.